Getting a Good Start

Sunday night I wrote my last post about how I wasn't ready to start school yet. Monday morning my kids decided we had to start anyway. Henry busted out his explode the code book and Ian grabbed his Singapore Math book. Sophie is just enamored with Life of Fred Fractions (she calls him the "Nevada man". I guess his head does sort of look like the shape of Nevada.) So, they jumped in before I could pull back on the reigns. We didn't do a whole lot on Monday since we also had an orthodontist appointment which always seem to eat up our morning.

By afternoon,  one or two pages of work and a book read aloud they were done and just wanted to play. I let them, while I did a little more prep work in order to make me feel more ready to officially start another school year.  I hung a map of the world on the wall. I really want to do FIAR with Henry and Ian and plan to do the story disks on that map just like I did with Sophie a few years back. I also printed out and laminated some passports for their FIAR travels. Sophie wanted a new one because hers is out of date now.  So I guess I am committed to doing at least a few Five in a Row books this year.

I was also really happy to just let them play all afternoon because I was finishing a book, Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell. I was just to the really interesting climax and just didn't want to stop reading. If anyone needs a good book to read Elizabeth Gaskell is great. I have read several of her books and they are all good and have made me think and ponder.  This one even had a bit of a murder mystery thrown in.  So I finished it and now can focus on something else for a bit.

I woke up this morning and started the day by reading a conference talk from April's conference. It really is good for me to start the day with scripture rather than a novel. Yesterday I had gotten up early to read my novel (I was hooked!) and I think it affected my entire day because I was a bit more fractious than I was today. I need to make sure I am up early enough for me to get a little personal scripture study first thing in the morning. It just doesn't do as much good when I do it later in the day.

My kids begged me to do Story of the World this morning. I find that so funny that they were asking to do school and I actually told them no. I wasn't ready yet. They continued to beg so I gave in. I guess we could have just read the first chapter of Story of the World but instead we read about Queen Victoria from Our Island Story.  We also looked at a book we have of castles and palaces and saw where she lived and even a few paintings of her and Albert.

But the best thing we did today was set our schedule for each day. I sat down with the kids and we drew in our daily schedule for a week blocking out the time for each event and such during the day. I explained that we can't eat except at assigned times during the day. We have had a problem with continual grazing throughout the day and the kitchen always seemed open. So we blocked in our meals and snacks as well as our chore and study times. I think this will help us a lot! I need it and it is good for the kids to know exactly what to expect and when. I didn't get specific enough as to block out each subject and when we would do them. I just put chores, school, study, or free time. I just hope we can stick to it for awhile.

So we have sort of "started school" but I can't say we are really going yet.  We will see how we fit it all in. Our schedule already looks so packed.